Since 1883 The Chelsea Hotel has been a home to artists great and small, from icons such as Bob Dylan, Patti Smith, Tennessee Williams, Charles Bukowski, Andy Warhol, and Mark Twain, to assorted aspirants, junkies, prostitutes, and hermits. But new management has begun evicting boho tenants in favor of a more upscale crowd, prompting long-time resident – and consummate New Yorker – Ferrara to capture the ragged splendor of the place before its unique spirit is lost forever. Trolling the low-lit halls, visiting the hotel’s cast of memorable characters and raconteurs, and hanging out in the gallery-like lobby strewn with tenants’ paintings, “Chelsea on the Rocks” is shot through with an infectious brio, gallows humor and a hard-knock warmth to match its uniquely beloved subject. As yet another of New York’s cultural landmarks threatens to effectively vanish for the sake of a bland corporate status quo, Ferrara passionately shows how it’s often the misfit structures – and dwellers – that possess a city’s soul.

Rome: on the night of November 2, 1975, the great Italian poet and filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini is murdered. Pasolini is the symbol of an art that’s fighting against the power. His writings are scandalous, and his films are persecuted by the censors; many people love him and many hate him. The day of his death, Pasolini spends his last hours with his beloved mother and later with his dearest friends, until he finally goes out into the night in his Alfa Romeo in search of adventure in the eternal city. At dawn Pasolini is found dead on a beach in Ostia on the outskirts of the city. In a film dreamlike and visionary, blending reality and imagination, it reconstructs the last day in the life of this great poet. [Synopsis courtesy of Toronto International Film Festival]

A shy and mute seamstress goes insane after being attacked and raped twice in one day. She wanders the New York streets at night in a sexy black dress with her attacker’s gun strapped to her garter belt, blowing away any man who tries to pick her up.